Why must I make things hard for myself?

I am one of those people that HAVE to learn things for myself. I also tend to be one of those people that need the same lesson several times before it REALLY sinks in. So far, this week has been one of the most stressful I’ve had for a while, though not for reasons one would expect.

I’ve been helping coach the high school volleyball team at Perry County Central High School, here in Hazard. This week is the week of Bluegrass State Games. Something we’ve known about for some time. I have known for about a month that we were leaving on a Thursday evening. As it turns out, that Thursday was today. However, I failed to realize that this week was going to be a VERY short week, which meant I was going to have a VERY condensed work week! ARGH!

Suddenly, late last week it sunk in and I proceeded to plan to work LONG days Monday through Thursday in the hopes of getting in a full week before leaving for Lexington. As it turns out, it was decided on Monday that we would be redoing the dry wall in our bed room. After we removed the old panels that were on the wall, it was discovered that there was quite a large hole in the old plywood that backed the brick wall on the exterior of the house. This meant we also had to rebuild almost the entire back wall of that room! What was going to be a single day project was now going to take two days. Two days I didn’t have to give up.

To make things more complicated, we have recently acquired a flea infestation! Jennifer has been diligently spraying and vacuuming the house in an attempt to stop the infestation in it’s tracks. For a full week, it appeared no progress was being made, but last night we noticed we weren’t being bitten anywhere near as much.

So where am I going with this? How does all this relate to lessons being learned the hard way? Well, all week the plan, for today (Thursday) was to bowl league then head out to Lexington at about 8:30pm-9pm and meet up with the volleyball team here. I had also planned on bringing my bowling gear with me, just in case we came across enough free time to bowl a few games whilst here in Lexington.

Well, our team mate called and said he couldn’t bowl tonight, so we decided we would make it up next week. So, I assumed that since we wouldn’t have to bowl, we should be able to get out even earlier, giving us a longer stay here tonight and more time to relax a little in the hotel before Bluegrass games start.

Well, at about 4pm we noticed we were getting eaten a little more. I had already spent a large portion of the day to pack some garbage to our burn pile in preparation of being burnt, so my assumption was we just had to do some simple tidying up of the house and we would be on our way. I did a little more programming work, then loaded the dishwasher and relaxed a little thinking we would be on the way within the hour. By now, it’s about 7pm.

However, Jennifer was now refocused on killing the fleas and decided to clean off the porch, so our cats could be housed outside while we were away. After rebuilding a small portion of our porch to allow the water to drain off better I mentioned maybe seeing if I could get a ride to the bowling alley with my step father-in-law to get our bowling gear. This suggestion was quickly met with a sharp comment from Jennifer basically saying we’re not going bowling at all while we’re in Lexington.

I don’t know why, but I tend to react VERY badly when I’ve had certain plans in my head only to have someone else change them for me at the last minute. I suspect it’s because I experienced a lot of disappointment in my childhood. There was many times that I wanted to do something, or go somewhere, but it wasn’t possible since we either didn’t have the money, or the time, or both, to allow that to happen. This meant we often had to forego stuff. My mother’s common response to requests of any sort was “maybe.” This response was usually synonymous with “no.” While I understand why that was the case now, it has left it’s legacy.

This sets up the struggle Jennifer and I battle with on an almost weekly basis. Often I’ll mention that go somewhere later in the day. Usually, it’s bowling, but it’s often other stuff as well, like going to Walmart to get something or getting something to eat. About 60% of the time, we’ll get to about the time we agreed to leave and Jennifer tells me she doesn’t feel like it anymore. Often the reason is very valid, like she’s tired from a lack of sleep the night before, or she’s not feeling very good for whatever reason. Unfortunately, 90% of the time all I hear is “We’re not going because I don’t feel like it.” Because of this, an argument is usually just around the corner and today was no different. However, today’s result was a little different…

After being told I’m not allowed to bowl, I found out soon after that we would most likely not be leaving until after 10pm. It’s now around 8pm, so I ask what we need to do to get out of here. Doing the last of the dishes, clearing any left over food from the bench and taking out the garbage was the response. At this time, Jennifer was finishing off some laundry. So, I proceeded to fill the dishwasher, throw all the scraps out to the animals and took the garbage out. At this time, after previously being told I couldn’t bowl, Jennifer decided to tell me she doesn’t want to travel tonight and that we should leave in the early hours of the morning. It’s now 9pm and Jennifer was wanting leave at 4am, to ensure we got to Lexington in time for a meeting in the morning.

This was the last straw for me. Basically, every one of the day’s expectation were now blown, I’d lost all chance of completing a full work week, getting just a half work week instead and now all the effort I’d put in to ensure we could get out of Hazard tonight was all for nothing. To top things off, Jennifer then decided she was going to come back to Hazard, to make sure the fleas stayed at bay, so now I wasn’t going to get to spend ANY time with my family while we were away! All my expectations for the weekend have basically vanished.

The argument that ensued was rather explosive, as was some of my behavior. I hate to admit it, but one of my reactions when I feel extreme disappointment is to throw stuff around. A trick I learned from my mother I’m afraid. I basically spent close to 2 hours fuming, throwing stuff around and just behaving like a petulant child, throwing all his toys from his cot!

Eventually, Jennifer cracked and we were now in a full yelling match neither one willing to budge. Jennifer now resolved to bring me to Lexington, but return home immediately, leaving me here by myself. This is exactly the scenario that played out. We left Lily and Hayden with Cindy and Greg and left for Lexington. Jennifer dropped me off a little under 90 minutes ago, at about 2.50am and proceeded to make the 2.5 hour drive back to Hazard alone… in the SAME car that spat it’s wad on us when we went to Newport, KY just 5 weeks ago.

So here I sit, at 4.20am unable to sleep because I’m too stressed about my wife driving home all alone in an unreliable vehicle. I need to get up in just 2 hours, but sleep is the last thing on my mind right now. I want my family here. If I had just got on with it and shut my big bloody mouth, they would be here with me as I write this.

My wife is heart of our household. She does the vast majority of the work in the house, mostly because I just don’t see clutter the same way she does. If left to my own devices, I would pile stuff up around me for days, even weeks, before the thought of perhaps removing it would be in my best interests. I must admit that I take her granted a lot of the time. On top of that, I expect her to just take me places when I need to get somewhere and I expect her to do so without protest. Therein lies my biggest crime.

This expectation is what lies at the root of everything that happened tonight. I need to relearn how to cope with sudden changes to plans and missed expectations. I also need to learn to consider more completely the feelings and needs of my wife. I love my wife very much, but I’m not the most demonstrative of human beings. Consequences of some stuff that happened years ago, long before I met Jennifer.

At the end of the day, not getting out of town on time is not a huge deal. Not getting to go bowling, or doing something else is not that big a deal either. I need to learn how to put all this stuff in perspective and react in a more rational manner. For a man who’s job deals with logic for a large part of the day, I am definitely one of the most irrational men you will ever meet.

Jennifer, I love you! I miss you already and I sincerely hope you change your mind and come back to Lexington some time this weekend. It’s only after I’ve gone too far and said and done things I don’t really mean that I realize how much I take you for granted.

I’m sorry…